


of all the things that help

by luckybarton



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Abuse, Childhood Trauma, Family Feels, Found Family, Gen, Healing, Magical Transition, Mentioned Hermione Granger, Mild Hurt/Comfort, Rejection, Trans Harry Potter, Trans Male Character, Trans Male Harry Potter, Transphobia, fic written to spite JKR's transphobia, the weasleys - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-20
Updated: 2019-12-20
Packaged: 2021-02-25 05:47:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,051
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21871054
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/luckybarton/pseuds/luckybarton
Summary: Harry comes out as a trans man at Hogwarts to little fanfare or dramatics, because Wizarding society is like that. The Dursleys are another story.
Comments: 22
Kudos: 301





	of all the things that help

Through a series of flukes, Harry both realises he's trans and comes out within a few weeks of starting his first year at Hogwarts. Hogwarts has never tried to be especially accommodating of its Muggleborn students, taking them as a sort of strange fluke that happens every year. Harry isn't Muggleborn, but his upbringing means that he gets caught by the same assumptions, the same presumed experience and knowledge.

Most of the time, it hurts. The realisation that he didn't know something he was supposed to. Turning to the whisper network the Muggleborns of the school have formed to spread information, so that collectively they can all save face. Hermione isn't even an exception: she's book smart (very), but she also doesn't know things like how wizards brush their teeth or how, precisely, to think about Wizarding money.

A very small amount of the time, it's a blessing. The Wizarding section of the UK is, to a certain degree, stuck in the dark ages. In some ways, however, it's shockingly liberal—often in ways that Muggle society hasn't considered yet. When they talk about queer witches and wizards in class, it's without much note toward their identity. They just  _ are. _ It's so different to the typical Muggle school's approach that another student eventually asks a very rudely phrased question and their entire year has the whole thing explained to them by Professor Sprout.

The next day, Harry gives himself a haircut (which doesn't help the messiness of his unruly black hair, but does make it shorter) and asks to be called a boy. He already goes by the short version of his name, and overall there isn't much to adjust. The school understands and carries on.

Home is another matter. Harry thinks of what the Dursleys would think, then decides that there's a chance, a little chance, that they'll take it well. That in a singular aspect, he'll be able to be himself for the summer.

The Dursleys do not take it well. They scream every epithet and slur under the sun, threaten to never send him back to Hogwarts. Harry takes it back. Mrs. Dursley doubles down on the gendered words she refers to him with. The ugly clothing she scrounges when his clothes get too small are pink and purple. They don't allow him to visit his friends, or even see the post that they send. When the time to go to Hogwarts finally rolls around again and Harry isn't on the train, Hagrid busts the door down for a second time. The Dursleys, feeling threatened and distracted by the cost of attaching new hinges to their door, let him go.

The entire time it takes to reach Diagon Alley for a whistle-stop tour of the shops that sell Harry's second-year supplies, Harry doesn't speak in more than one-word utterances. When he does, it's in Flourish and Blotts. He isn't even trying to say anything  _ about _ the Dursleys, but a sob escapes and he can't stop crying. Whole-body-shaking crying that he hasn't allowed himself to do for the whole break.

Hagrid buys him a notebook. "If anyone except you tries to open it, it will bite their hand," he promises. He wraps him in a burly hug, and doesn't make him go anywhere else until he's ready to. The final stop in Diagon Alley ends up being to a barber, so Harry can get his hair cut short again.

In the second year, Madame Pomfrey offers Harry a spell which would allow him to develop as a man.

"If at some point you don't like it, we can change it so its direction is female or more neutral," she said. "Any effects you dislike can be changed as well. If that happens, don't feel bad about letting me know."

It doesn't happen, though, and at the end of the year, Harry point-blank refuses to go back to the Dursleys. Someone suggests 'going back to being a girl for the summer - why don't you just use the other spell?' but the idea is so abhorrent that Harry runs away instead. He never actually comes home. The Dursleys, it seems, don't investigate. He  _accios_ some stolen mail and uses the address to find Ron's house. He arrives disheveled and exhausted. 

He doesn't want to talk much about what happened with the Weasleys. Ron has a pretty good idea about how horrible the Dursleys were and has probably passed the information on, but Harry doesn't even want to think about  _ that. _ He doesn't want to provoke anything which could make the Weasleys hate him the way the Dursleys did and force him back into their care. Every time he speaks, he walks on glass.

Eventually, they catch on, sit him down, and let him know that they will never force him out. It helps, but not entirely. Nothing ever fully wipes out the fear.

In the beginning of his third year at Hogwarts, the Weasleys, with Harry's permission, formally tell Hogwarts that Harry will be staying with them in the summer from now on—as if it could really be as simple as just saying so. It's initially refused, but the evidence Harry shows when he's interviewed would render any blood protection he might have gotten from staying with the Dursleys null and void, and sending a wizarding caseworker to their house gives more than enough confirmation that it isn't a safe place to stay.

A rumor circulates saying that Mrs. Weasley sent a howler to Dumbledore, but it's never proven true.

Christmas with the Weasleys is pleasant. Harry feels accepted by the whole family, but it doesn't change the fact that he spends the nights petrified that he'd do something terrible, that something awful was about to happen.  _ 'Why are you all being so nice to me?' _ repeats in his head until he eventually chokes it out. Nobody really has an answer as of such, because nobody had seen what they were doing as  _ particularly nice. _

"If they weren't Muggles and it wasn't Christmas, I'd send  _ them _ a howler," Mrs. Weasley remarks.

When it comes time to return to Hogwarts, it's bittersweet. Harry still doesn't feel quite right, but he knows he has somewhere to go back to. Of all the things that help, it's knowing that which helps the most.


End file.
